“Churot,” Adam called, staring at the answers on the paper. “I understand that no normal person would buy three hundred and sixty apples, five crates of soap, and two mirrors, but that’s just part of the question.”

“No sense,” Churot replied, simply.

“That part isn’t meant to make sense, it’s just part of the question,” Adam said, rubbing the side of his forehead.

Churot remained silent, his eyes still staring up at the Half Elf. He was as stubborn as an ox, as one might have expected of the boy. He, who had grown under the comfort of his grandfather and grandmother, had been spoiled constantly. There was almost never a time he wasn’t near his grandfather and his tender care.

“The guy who brought the apples, soap, and mirrors was a merchant,” Adam said. “He bought them in order to sell them off, so you need to answer the questions.”

Right. Merchants. Churot knew of those people, those who bought wares and sold them off. Sometimes Iyrmen would act as merchants, selling off a few wares in order to bring the coin back for the Iyr, but that’s not how the merchants typically worked.

“Why must I answer questions about merchants?” Churot asked, speaking the longest sentence he had in some time.

“It’s to test you,” Adam replied. “I know that chariots cannot travel at one hundred kilometres an hour either, but I hope that Churot, who I know to be such a good young man, will answer the questions properly. Otherwise I’ll have to assume that you don’t know the answer to the questions, and I won’t be able to teach you properly.”

Churot stared up at the Half Elf, his face still blank. He let out a soft breath and took the paper to answer the questions he had answered incorrectly.

Once he received the paper back, Adam marked the answers which Churot had first answered incorrectly. “I didn’t realise our Churot was so smart.”

Jarot huffed, about to complain when Mulrot pinched his arm. Her eyes told her husband to leave them be and to mind his own business. She understood it was a difficult ask, but this was for their grandson’s future.

Adam continued to test the young boy, from simple maths to more complicated maths. Eventually, Adam brought that thing into maths, a most devilish invention.

Churot stared at the question before him. His eyes raised up towards Adam, wondering if Adam was joking with him. “What is this?”

“Maths,” Adam replied.

“Why is there a cross with the numbers?” Churot asked.

“This is called algebra,” Adam said. “It is useful for maths.”

Churot furrowed his brows. ‘Are you trying to stop me from learning magic?’ He wondered if Adam was trying to wriggle out of the promise he had made.

Adam could see the look in Churot’s eyes. Adam wondered if he looked at his teacher the same way when he brought letters into maths. “I know how you feel, Churot, but this is real. Can you answer it?”

“No,” Churot replied.

“Why don’t you try first?” Adam asked.

“I do not know how.”

“Good point.” Adam chuckled. “That was rather silly of me, wasn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“It was a rhetorical question.”

Churot wondered if Adam and he truly spoke the same language. Adam showed Churot how to answer the question in order to find what the value of the letter x was. After a handful of examples, Adam left Churot to answer the questions.

Even Mulrot wasn’t sure why Adam was combining both letters and maths together.

“What?” Adam asked, staring at the pair of them, who had been sitting nearby, drinking warm milk and eating snacks.

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“Why are you using letters and maths together?”

“It’s meant to be useful,” Adam said. ‘I guess they don’t have algebra in this world? Or perhaps in just this land?’

“Useful? How?”

“Uh,” Adam replied. “From where I’m from, people learn this just to make life easy. I know that there are mathematicians who use algebra to find out all kinds of things.”

“What kinds of things?”

Adam paused, trying to think. “Everything?”

“Everything?”

“Everything.”

Jarot exchanged a look with Mulrot.

‘They definitely have Arabic numerals at least,’ Adam thought. If they hadn’t, he wasn’t sure how awkward maths would have been in this world. ‘Who was it that developed it? India, right? What else did they develop?’ Adam tried to remember what he had learnt about how different technologies spread through the world. ‘Right. We have start with the Greeks, India, and China. Then we have the Islamic golden age, followed by the European renaissance, and finally colonialism.’

Adam began to write down different notes, writing them in English. It was different to the languages of this world, and there didn’t seem to be anyone else in the world, so he felt safe writing down these dangerous ideas.

“What are you writing?” Jarot asked.

“Some stuff,” Adam replied.

“Is that Elvish?”

“No,” Adam replied. “It’s… it’s the language of my home.”

“What is it?”

Adam shook his head. “It’s best not to know.”

“Keeping secrets from your grandfather?” Jarot asked.

“Who is my grandfather?” Adam replied.

“You will accept me one day.”

“We’ll see.”

“You will not tell me what you are writing?” Jarot asked.

“I’m just writing down things to eventually introduce to the Iyr,” Adam said.

“Like pizza?”

Adam smiled. “Something like that.”

Churot brought his test to Adam, having finished answering them.

“Ho,” Adam said. “How smart are you, Churot?” The young Devilkin had managed to ace the test with flying colours.

“I am smart,” Churot stated.

“Our Churot has always had a good memory,” Jarot said. “He remembers most things which are told to him the first time.” He ruffled Churot’s hair, who smiled slightly.

“How amazing,” Adam said, smiling down at the teen. “Then I have the best student to teach. I’ll have to put in more effort in teaching you then. I’ll try and figure out how to teach you magic, but until then, learn the concepts I’m showing you.”

Churot remained staring blankly at Adam.

Over the next few days, Adam continued to teach Churot various concepts, basic concepts to him, but new concepts to Churot. The concept of a number line and negative numbers was something Churot had never learnt before, but it wasn’t long until Churot understood them.

‘This kid is so smart,’ Adam thought, rubbing his chin. As Churot had been learning the concepts, Adam had spent some time creating a spell scroll, using the Iyr’s materials to create a scroll for his trick and a scroll for a first gate spell.

The Iyrmen nearby, all members of the Rot family, had been watching him as he created the scroll for them to see. They didn’t understand why Adam had shown them all the process of how he made the spell scroll, but they decided against refusing such good fortune.

“Will you teach me magic now?” Churot asked.

“I’ll try,” Adam replied. “You should thank your lucky stars that I don’t remember calculus, otherwise you’ll hate me so much you’ll refuse learning magic out of principle.”

“I wish to learn magic,” the Devilkin teen stated.

Adam revealed each scroll to him. Adam, as he had written down the spell scrolls, had realised how much maths and magic had in common. Though he didn’t recall every mathematics concept out there, he had found the similarities between maths and magic as he drew the scroll.

“Can you spot the difference between these two?” Adam asked.

“This scroll is more detailed,” Churot said, pointing to the pattern on one spell scroll.

“That’s right,” Adam replied, smiling at the Devilkin teen. “This is the first gate spell, and the other is a trick. Notice how each of them is a long line of magical runes, but every so often, the first gate contains more complex runes, sometimes with multiple runes stacked together.”

Adam brought out his spellbook, before turning to the page for Identify, and placed the scroll side by side. “Can you spot the differences?”

Churot paused, looking to his grandfather, who was also slightly puzzled. Jarot, however, nodded his head slowly, allowing Churot to look at the spellbook.

“They are the same spell, but they have different symbols?” Churot asked, noting that most of the symbols were the same, but there were small differences near the beginning of the spell.

“Exactly. The difference is that this first section in my spellbook defines the time it requires to cast the spell, but when you cast off of a spellscroll, the time changes to a moment, right?”

“Yes,” the boy replied.

“So then we have something further in which has changed, right?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know what the difference is this time?”

Churot thought about it for a moment. He knew how it was when it came to Blood Mages, but he wasn’t sure about Scribe Mages. “It is the components required for the spell?”

“Churot is not just a genius when it comes to maths, but magic too?” Adam asked. “I’m jealous.”

“Adam,” came a familiar voice.

Adam remained smiling at Churot, before slowly turning his head to see Elder Teacher, who was staring at the pair of them. “Yes, Elder Teacher?”

Elder Teacher remained silent for a long moment. Adam held a scroll before Churot, as well as his spellbook, which was open before the Devilkin teen. Elder Teacher had been a Great Elder for quite some time now, so he had many years in practising how to keep a straight face.

However, the utter confusion ran through the Great Elder’s blood as he tried to understand what was happening.